Total pages in book: 57
Estimated words: 52932 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 265(@200wpm)___ 212(@250wpm)___ 176(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 52932 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 265(@200wpm)___ 212(@250wpm)___ 176(@300wpm)
I will always be grateful to the man who offered us a second chance when my brother and I were twenty-one years old. There are many excuses I could give as to why I never returned to South Shields to see Shaun, but the main reason I stayed away was the pretty girl who I was never meant to care for. Before I walked out, I asked one thing of her, and I hope to God she listened to me.
Harley was far too fecking young for me. At sixteen, she was still a child. One that had grown up way too fast in her father’s world. Even though she wasn’t meant for me, I still cared about her. She would follow me around, watching me whenever I was in her father’s house. To begin with, I told her to leave me alone and not to look up to me, but she didn’t listen, and in the end, we became friends. I always knew she wanted more than friendship, but that was never going to happen.
I told her she needed to get out of that shite life and go to college. I wanted her to make something of herself. I hope to God she did. When I first decided to join the seminary, I thought about finding her to see if she’d managed to escape. But I knew if I did, I wouldn’t be able to let her go again.
The thought of bumping into her now, fills me with equal measures of dread and excitement. I don’t know how I feel about looking into those green almost luminous, alluring eyes again. The last time I saw her, she used them to shoot daggers at me.
I park our hire car outside the old warehouse. Its once intimidating façade now looks worn and forgotten. The place where my brother and I spent our working days, all those years ago, still remains as a monument to the choices we made, the lives we took, and the people we left behind.
Hades stands on one side of me and Racer on the other, their tall frames silhouetted against the dim light of the setting sun. My brother glances at me, a mixture of concern and determination in his eyes.
“You ready for this, mate?” he asks, his voice steady despite the tension.
I take a deep breath, trying to calm my nerves.
“As ready as I’ll ever be,” I reply, my voice betraying the unease I feel. “Seems like a lifetime ago.”
“It does,” he agrees, looking at the empty building. “A lot has changed since then.”
We step inside, and the creak of the door echoes through the empty space. The air is thick with the scent of oil and dust. It’s a familiar yet unsettling aroma that brings back a flood of memories—the meetings with Harley’s father, Shaun, who took us in and gave us work, the whispered plans, and the reading out of the names of men Hades and I had to talk to when they didn’t pay up. There was always a constant sense of danger here.
This place was our life once. A life we both chose to leave behind.
Hades stops by a stack of old crates, his fingers tracing the worn wood.
“Ya know, sometimes I think about those days when we used to do shite for Hunt. It was one of the best times of our lives and far better than livin’ with Da. But then again, when I recall the people we were and the things we did, it’s like looking back at two completely different men.”
I nod, understanding exactly what he means.
“We made the right choice, walking away. But it wasn’t an easy one.”
“No, it wasn’t,” he says, his voice heavy with the weight of the past. “But we’re here now, and that’s what matters. We need to find out what the feck is happening to the shipments coming in.”
“This place is filled with crates, but they’re all empty,” Racer remarks as we move through the warehouse.
He’s right. The space is almost half full, but there’s nothing in the crates. It looks like they’ve been emptied, and the contents shipped off somewhere else. Unless this place is now used as a decoy.
We continue walking through the building, the memories of my past life hanging in the air like ghosts. As we continue to search though the crates, a comfortable silence falls between the three of us—the kind only brothers share.
Finally, Hades turns to me, his expression serious. “You said you were nervous about seeing Harley again.”
I swallow hard, the mention of her name sending a jolt through my heart. “Aye,” I admit, my voice barely above a whisper. “It’s been a long time. I don’t know what to expect if I do bump into her.”
“Who’s Harley?” Racer asks, stopping suddenly, his focus pinned on me, which I hate. Even though I’ve spent most of my adult life being asked for advice, I always hate talking about myself.